With his wife and her sister JFK Jr. took off at 20:38 hr on Friday night in his Piper Saratoga from Essex County Airport Fairfield, New Jersey, which is under the New York controlled airspace.

He flew Eastward along the Connecticut coast at 5600 ft until 21:26 hr and descended to 2300 ft (700 ft/min) at Westerly Rhode Island, which is an uncontrolled airspace, about 34 miles from the Martha's Vineyard airport.

It made a right turn to the South and climbed to 2600 ft for a minute, about 18 miles from the airport at 21:39. The plane made another right turn, 30 sec into the maneuver and lost altitude rapidly to 1100 ft translated into more than 5000 ft/min, when the normal descent is between 500 to 700 ft/min. That was the beginning of the end.

At 21:40:29 when the plane was at 1100 ft disappeared from the radar of Controller's Princetown, Mass., about 16.5 miles Southwest of Martha's Vineyard, in the Atlantic.